PALO ALTO, CA: Silicon Valley’s largest firm has finally decided to enter the dot-com race.
PALO ALTO, CA: Silicon Valley’s largest firm has finally decided to
enter the dot-com race.
Cunningham Communications, known for its long-standing relationships
with corporate hi-tech players like Cisco, last week announced a
restructuring that effectively splits the agency into several individual
companies - two of which will specialize in serving Internet
start-ups.
Under the new organization, Cunningham becomes a parent company for six
independently operated units. Four of these new companies - Cunningham
PR, Brand Momentum, Momentum Research and InMomentum - are simply
formalizations of existing practice areas. However, two of the newly
created groups, the Austin-based Cunningham Ventures and San
Francisco-based Fifth Gear, represent a radical shift for the firm,
which has been slow to toss its hat into the Internet start-up
arena.
’Both are geared toward working with the dot-coms in their local
geographies, and both will be experimenting with different economic
models,’ such as a mix of cash and equity for service, said chair and
CEO Andy Cunningham.
She confirmed that the announcement signaled a shift toward aggressive
expansion and away from her firm’s history of fairly conservative
growth.
